Why happy employees help. How meaningfulness, collectivism, and support transform job satisfaction into helping behaviours
| Pages | 1001-1021 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/PR-02-2018-0052 |
| Date | 04 June 2019 |
| Published date | 04 June 2019 |
| Author | Dirk De Clercq,Inam Ul Haq,Muhammad Umer Azeem |
| Subject Matter | Hr & organizational behaviour |
Why happy employees help
How meaningfulness, collectivism, and
support transform job satisfaction into
helping behaviours
Dirk De Clercq
Goodman School of Business, Brock University, St Catharines, Canada
Inam Ul Haq
Lahore Business School, The University of Lahore, Lahore, Pakistan, and
Muhammad Umer Azeem
School of Business and Economics,
University of Management and Technology, Lahore, Pakistan
Abstract
Purpose –Drawing from conservation of resources theory, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the
relationship between employees’job satisfaction and helping behaviour, and, particularly, how it may be moderated
by two personal resources (work meaningfulness and collectivistic orientation) and one organisational resource
(organisational support).
Design/methodology/approach –Quantitative data were collected from a survey administered to
employees and their supervisors in a Pakistani-based organisation.
Findings –The usefulness of job satisfaction for stimulating helping behaviour is greater when employees
believe that their work activities are meaningful, emphasise collective over individual interests, and believe
that their employer cares for their well-being.
Practical implications –The results inform organisations about the circumstances in which they can best
leverage employees’positive job energy, which arises from their job satisfaction, to encourage their voluntary
assistance of other organisational members.
Originality/value –This study extends research on positive work behaviours by examining the concurrent
roles that job satisfaction and several contingent factors play in promoting employee helping behaviour.
In particular, it highlights the invigorating effects of these factors on the usefulness of the enthusiasm that
employees feel about their job situation for increasing their willingness to extend help to other members, ona
voluntary basis.
Keywords Quantitative, Job satisfaction, Perceived organizational support, Collectivistic orientation,
Helping behaviour, Work meaningfulness
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Employeescan contribute significantlyto their organisations’competitiveadvantages through
their helping behaviours or propensity to voluntarily assist co-workers in completing their job
tasks (Choi and Moon, 2016; Chou and Stauffer, 2016; Tang et al., 2008; Zhu and Akhtar, 2014).
Such helping behaviours, not required by formal job descriptions, can enhance the success of
individual co-workers, the collective performance of selected groups of employees, and the
organisation overall (Bachrach et al., 2006; Borman and Motowidlo, 1993; Cirella, 2016; Ng and
Van Dyne,2005; Podsakoff et al., 1997), as well as benefit the performers of these activities. For
example, employees who take an active interest in the well-being of co-workers and assist them
voluntarily may experience personal fulfilment (Hoption, 2016; Lemoine et al., 2015) and receive
reciprocal help from those co-workers (Deckop et al., 2003; Hui et al., 2000). Performing
voluntary helping activities can also be challenging for employees though, in that these
activities can lead tofatigue and underminetheir ability tocomplete their ownregular job tasks
(Bolino et al., 2015; Koopman et al., 2016). In particular, when employees spend significant time
Personnel Review
Vol. 48 No. 4, 2019
pp. 1001-1021
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0048-3486
DOI 10.1108/PR-02-2018-0052
Received 7 February 2018
Revised 12 September 2018
Accepted 16 December 2018
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0048-3486.htm
1001
Job satisfaction
into helping
behaviours
listening to co-workers’problems or going out of their way to find solutions, the associated
distractions may reduce their focus on completing the job tasks that have been formally
assigned to them (Bergeron, 2007; Van Dyne and Ellis, 2004).
In light of the benefits and challenges that might come with exhibiting helping behaviour, we
propose that an important driver of such behaviours is the extent to which employees feel
satisfied with their job situation or the enthusiasm they express towards their work (Agho et al.,
1992; Rayton and Yalabik, 2014). Previous studies cite various positive outcomes of job
satisfaction, such as enhanced organisational commitment (Kim and Back, 2012), job
performance (Sun and Pan, 2008), innovation (Yen-Ku et al., 2014) and voluntary citizenship
behaviours (Chin, 2015). Yet beyond a general sense that job satisfaction stimulates employees to
do more than is required by their formal job descriptions, previous research has not established
universal support for its benefits. Rather, prior studies identify weak positive connections of job
satisfaction with extra-role work behaviours (Way et al., 2010) or caution that the links depend
on the strength of the positive attitudes that employees exhibit towards their job (Schleicher
et al., 2015). This ambiguity might stem from the time-consuming nature of voluntary efforts to
reach out to individual colleagues who seek help (Bolino et al., 2013; Podsakoff et al.,2009).Even
if positive job energy, in the form of job satisfaction, spurs employees to undertake helping
behaviours, these efforts might be perceived as worthwhile only to the extent that employees
can rely on valuable resources that make the outcomes of their efforts attractive (Hobfoll and
Shirom, 2000). Employees might not be willing to channel their positive job energy into
discretionary helping behaviour, and the key question becomes, Which circumstances trigger
this energy allocation? This research gap warrants further attention (Schleicher et al., 2015).
In response, we seek to gain a better understanding of the conditions in which job
satisfaction is most likely to spur discretionary helping behaviours, so that organisational
decision makers can establish when these behaviours are most likely to materialize among
happy employees (Schleicher et al., 2015). The theoretical arguments for how and when
employees’job satisfaction stimulates their propensity to help their colleagues are anchored
in conservation of resources (COR) theory. According to this theory, employees’engagement
in discretionarywork behaviours is informedby the resource gains that theyexpect to achieve
from these behaviours (Hobfoll, 1989, 2001). In particular, this theory postulates that
employeesare more likely to undertake positivework behaviours, such as helpingco-workers,
to the extent that they can leverage their current personal energy reservoirs to create
additional resource gains (Hobfoll, 2001). Assisting co-workers voluntarily can be beneficial
for employees, in that it might generate reciprocal behaviours at some later point in time
(Deckop et al.,2003) or offer a general senseof fulfilment (Hoption, 2016).Thus, the application
of positive jobenergy derived from job satisfaction may generate significant resource gainsif
employees undertake helping behaviours.
In addition, COR theory suggests an important invigorating role of employees’access
to complementary resources –whether personally held or embedded in the surrounding
organisational context (Hobfoll and Shirom, 2000) –for predicting their positive work
behaviours. This access may trigger allocations of personal energy resources to these
behaviours, in anticipation of the additional benefits that result from such allocations. As
the notion of resource gain spirals suggests (Hobfoll, 1988, 2001), the process of
channelling positive job energy into discretionary work activities is especially effective
when employees have access to complementary resources that make the
process personally attractive. Consistent with this logic, we postulate that the positive
energy that employees derive from their own job satisfaction spurs their helping
behaviours to a greater extent when they believe their work is meaningful, possess a
strong collectivistic orientation, and perceive that they operate in a supportive
organisational environment. A sense of work meaningfulness captures the extent to which
employees deem their work important (Fry et al., 2005; Luoh et al., 2014); their collectivistic
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